By James Reston Jr.,
author of "Warriors of God," about the Third Crusade, and "Dogs of God," about
the Christian reconquest of Spain. He is working on a book about the Ottoman
Empire
Thursday, May 3, 2007; C05

PEACE BE
UPON YOU

The
Story of Muslim, Christian, and Jewish Coexistence

By Zachary
Karabell

Knopf. 343
pp. $26.95

The only
good things to come of 9/11, some say, are a greater consciousness of and a
keener sensitivity to Islamic history, religion and culture. If that is so, the
education has been slow and painful in the past six years, made all the more
difficult by the gruesome reality of the Iraq war.

The
education has been impeded by terrible conceptual mistakes, the first and most
fundamental of which occurred five days after the catastrophe when President
Bush proclaimed an American crusade. This deflected attention from mass murder
and defined the coming struggle -- much to the joy of al-Qaeda, no doubt -- in
terms of Western crusade and Eastern jihad. Donald Rumsfeld tried to scare us
with the fantasy of a worldwide Islamic "caliphate." The Danish cartoons
insulted Muhammad in the name of free expression, and the pope weighed in with
his dense imputation that Islam was an "evil and inhuman" religion.

These
gaffes and deliberate provocations come from an ignorance of Islamic history and
overlook the intensity with which historical symbols are felt in the Arabic
world. If we can begin to dream of a postwar period in the near future when
reconciliation with the Arab world -- as well as healing at home -- is the
imperative, then a healthier respect for the traditions of those we have
attacked and insulted might be a good start.

Zachary
Karabell's "Peace Be Upon You" is a welcome and important contribution to this
historical phase that lies ahead. The book presents an overview of the relations
among Muslims, Christians and Jews since the time of Muhammad. As such, it
should be required reading for congressmen who must vote on billions for a civil
war between Shiites and Sunnis or presidential candidates who vie for the chance
to preside over a postwar America.

Karabell's
thesis is that the modern alienation between Islam and other faiths is a
historical anomaly. He contends, rightly, that peaceful coexistence, more than
conflict, characterizes the past 1,300 years of Islamic history. By contrast,
Christian history, with its crusades and inquisitions, has been far more
violent.

Karabell
believes that emphasizing the historical episodes of Muslim tolerance toward
other religions can be a "vital ingredient" to build upon in the future.
"Reclaiming the legacy of coexistence may not make the world whole," he writes,
"but it does show that Islam and the West need not be locked in a death dance."

This is a
book of broad strokes, categorical statements and historical snapshots,
fashioned into a hopeful, historical meditation. Above all, Karabell is intent
on debunking what he calls the "myth of endless conflict." In this, he returns
to the core lesson of Islam's holy book. Christians and Jews are seen in the
Koran as "People of the Book," misguided perhaps, blind to Muhammad's
corrections of their "perversions" maybe, but nevertheless believers in the same
God. Karabell quotes Surah 29:46: "Dispute not with the People of the Book save
in the fairer manner . . . and say, 'We believe in what has been sent down to
us, and what has been sent down to you. Our God and your God is One, and to him
we have surrendered.' "

Karabell
takes us on a swift journey through the important episodes of Islamic history:
the tribal conflicts in Mecca and Medina, the split between the Sunni and Shiite
interpretations, the golden age of Baghdad, the triumph of Saladin in the Third
Crusade, the unifying philosophy of the Jewish sage Maimonides, the golden age
of harmony between the faiths during the reign of Alfonso X in 13th-century
Spain, and the long hegemony of the Ottoman Empire. These are milestones of
world history about which Western audiences need to be far more aware.

Like the
teacher of a survey course with an agenda, Karabell sometimes moves too quickly,
can gloss over cruel and violent behavior by Islamic heroes, and occasionally
gets his facts wrong.

In 1099
after the fall of Jerusalem in the bloody First Crusade, we are told that a long
period of quiet ensued and that there was no sense in the Muslim world that this
was religious war. This belies the brief and troubled 80-year history of the
kingdom of Jerusalem from 1099 to 1187. We are told that "the Ottomans honored
the flag of truce" and protected the rights of the local population. This
scarcely squares with the scorched-earth policy of Suleiman the Magnificent in
his 16th-century Balkan campaigns, which included the burning of Budapest. When
the Ottomans were cruel, the author argues apologetically, they were simply
creatures of their medieval time.

We are told
accurately that Martin Luther admired the Ottoman system of administration, but
not that he saw the Turks as the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse and the evil
instrument by which God was punishing Christian sins. And surely Karabell knows
that Lawrence Durrell was not an American writer.

These
lapses and apologetics aside, Karabell's book is a worthy undertaking and a
stimulating, useful read. In general, his presentation is lucid, well written
and persuasive. It is true that the tradition of tolerance in Islamic history
deserves a greater appreciation. It is also true that a mature dialogue of
civilizations in the future must acknowledge violence and intolerance where it
exists.